[.ca] Lucy (ISBN 2253153818)

Surfaces:
Lucy is a well written book about a young girl coming of age, separated from her home and all that is familiar to her. The book deals with issues like displacement, sex, mothers, and rage. I was tempted to dismiss this book as pointless after reading it for the first time, but something about this book stayed with me. Like the ocean Lucy lived by and the Great Lake she visits, there is more to this book than just the waves on the surface. I recommend reading this book more than once and delving deeper than the first layer, you won't be disappointed.

Not bad, but not really good eithier...:
This was my first reading of Jamaica Kincaid. She has a short, concise style, which made me often feel like I was reading poetry. However, I felt that it also had some downsides, like stifling character growth. In Lucy, the title character comes to America to be an nanny for a rich couple with four young daughters. Lucy watches as their marriage crumbles and tries to avoid turning into her own mother, who for some reason she hates. I wish we knew a bit more about Lucy, like why she hated her homeland so much. It was an alright quick read, but had it been longer, I doubted it would have held my attention.

Lucy's Got Issues...:
she is the type of woman you want to hate one minute and feel sorry for the next. she had a very peculiar way of looking athe world. her views, on life love and sexuality. the story is set in the late 60's, but it is timeless. definately a story you wont forget...

LUCY, GET A LIFE...:
This book was utter nonsense. It starts off giving the impression that the book may end up going somewhere, but quite the opposite happens. There are many paragraphs that I like to consider "biblical". By this, I mean that the paragraphs themselves are worded very delicatly, but say absolutely nothing outside of "we ate dinner" or "I kissed him". Another annoying point of the book is the sheer promiscuity of many of the chapters. Again, the first chapter pertains to family life, and gives one the feeling of "gee, I might want to keep this and read it to my kids", but its demise follows. Kincaid sends the reader spiraling into a world of love "experimentation". In the chapters that are preoccupied with developing this, we see Lucy do more then simply "kiss" her boyfriends. By the end you not only stutter when you speak, but also feel like your time has been waisted. Why? Because the plot is nothing more then that of a midnight XXX movie on \otv\c! And the scenes are no different either. Now I'm willing to sacrifice an orthodox plot for a good book, but this is rediculous. I watched an interview with Jamaica Kincaid once on Charlie Rose. In this interview, she testifies that this is her story, as it happened. Please, a garbage truck driver has a story to tell as well, but no one really wants to hear it. Thanks Jamaica, for nothing. Normally, I would complain about much more, but it is this element that really dominates the book, thus giving me nothing more to complain about.

Horrible!:
I thought that this book was horrible. It had no plot line or a conflict. It also talked way too much about Lucy having sex with random guys or looking at mens hands to decide if they had a large \omale organ\c or not.